Brewster County

The Brewster County courthouse was built of red brick in 1888 in Second Empire design and is the only courthouse the county has ever had. This courthouse, along with the jail, were built at a cost of $27,000.

National Register Text

Constructed in 1887 in West Texas, the Brewster. County Courthouse is an interesting local "vernacular" interpretation of an architectural idiom which was to become known as the American Second Empire Style. This two-and-one- half story brick building laid in Common bond is rectangular in massing with thin, elongated pavilions advancing slightly from the center of each facade. No corner towers, which would be expected in this style, are in evidence.

All four facades are comprised of pairs of elongated, round arch window openings surmounted by curved, pressed-tin hood molds with a single voussoir on center. The window openings on the second story are slightly longer than those on the first story. Each bay of paired windows is delineated by vertical brick strips or referential pilasters. The Brewster County Courthouse rests on a small base of rusticated local limestone with a brick belt-course separating the facades between the first and second stories.

The shorter east and west facades are comprised of three bays of paired round arch window openings with a pressed-tin "frontispiece" doorway on the first floor pavilion comprised of a triangular pediment supported on single Doric pilasters resting on single paneled podiums, and a semicircular, two-pane light over paneled, wooden double doors. The longer north and south facades are comprised of two stories of five bays of paired round arch windows with similar pilaster strips. The north facade has no doorway and the recent addition of a two-story brick wing to the northwest half of this facade has obscured the two northwest bays and part of the north pavilion. The south facade has a similar pressed-tin "frontispiece" doorway, although the door itself has been removed and replaced with a twentieth century aluminum frame window. All original window frames (wooden, double-hung, four-over-four-light sash) have survived, with the exception of those on the second story of the east facade and portions of the second stories of the north and south facades. These have been replaced with fixed wooden shutters.

A pressed-tin entablature, comprised of a paneled frieze and a cornice, surmounts the building. Pairs of pressed-tin brackets are incorporated within the entablature and reflect the spacing of the brick pilaster strips below and serve as referential (or interpretative) capitals to them. Pressed-tin triangular pediments crown the pavilions throughout. The radically hipped, wood-framed, pyramidal roof of standing-seam-tin is capped by pressed-tin cresting in the pattern of a cornice. Triangular, two-paned dormers punctuate the roof line: four each on the north and south facades and two each on the east and west facades. Originally, each pavilion was capped with a large attenuated Mansard-like roof with a single round arch four-light window. These, however, were removed in the second half of this century.

The first floor of the wood-frame interior is bisected by a center hall on the east/west axis dividing offices equally on both sides. Exemplary pressed-tin ceilings and some of the original woodwork have survived. A handsome wooden staircase with "Eastlake-like" details rises from the first floor to the General Courtroom on the second floor. Extensive remodeling has taken place on the second floor. However, much of the original fabric has been maintained beneath the new paneling and above the newly lowered ceilings.